Transatlantic flight of Alcock and Brown

Alcock and Brown taking on mail
Statue of Alcock and Brown at London Heathrow Airport (now located at Brooklands Museum)

John Alcock and Arthur Brown were British aviators who, in 1919, made the first non-stop transatlantic flight.[1] They flew a modified First World War Vickers Vimy[2] bomber from St. John's, Newfoundland, to Clifden, County Galway, Ireland.[3] The Secretary of State for Air, Winston Churchill, presented them with the Daily Mail prize of £10,000 (equivalent to £580,500 in 2023) for the first crossing of the Atlantic Ocean by aeroplane in "less than 72 consecutive hours".[4][5] A small amount of mail was carried on the flight, making it the first transatlantic airmail flight. The two aviators were knighted by King George V at Windsor Castle a week later.

  1. ^ "Captain John Alcock and Lieutenant Arthur Whitten Brown". www.aviation-history.com.
  2. ^ "Alcock and Brown's Vickers Vimy biplane, 1919". Science Museum. Retrieved 4 February 2017.
  3. ^ "What are the wild waves saying". The Economist. 28 October 2010. Retrieved 3 November 2010.
  4. ^ "The New Daily Mail Prizes". Flight magazine. 5 April 1913. p. 393. Archived from the original on 27 April 2009. Retrieved 5 January 2009. £10,000 to the first person who crosses the Atlantic from any point in the United States, Canada, or Newfoundland to any point in Great Britain or Ireland in seventy-two continuous hours
  5. ^ "Into the Unknown: The daredevils who flew across an ocean". BBC. Retrieved 18 May 2024.

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